Untangle, Malwarebytes Join Forces on SMB Security

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SMB network security provider Untangle and endpoint protection and remediation provider Malwarebytes this week announced an agreement to integrate Malwarebytes' Endpoint Protection with Untangle's Command Center cloud security platform, offering administrators a single pane of glass to manage security orchestration across the network and connected devices.

"SMBs have limited resources and need an integrated security solution that is centralized and takes the guess work out of network security," Malwarebytes senior vice president of marketing Raj Mallempati said in a statement.

"By integrating Malwarebytes' Endpoint Protection with Untangle's Command Center, we are able to give network administrators at small and medium-sized businesses control and visibility into their environment," Mallempati added. "This integration is a security win as it gives customers an easy-to-use, centralized platform to ensure the safety of their networks and connected devices."

According to the companies, the combined solution offers the following benefits:

Greater visibility into the profile of hosts on the network including operating systems, installed software and security status.

Status of the last Malwarebytes scan, including time, duration, threats discovered, quarantined endpoints and any remediation.

Ability to initiate a Malwarebytes scan on any host, plus easy navigation between Untangle Command Center and Malwarebytes Management portal.

A single pane of glass for understanding the security status of the network and connected hosts, including identified threats and remediation.

"It can be overwhelming for companies to evaluate, deploy and manage disparate security solutions today," Osterman Research principal analyst Michael Osterman said in a statement.

"Untangle's seamless integration with Malwarebytes is particularly compelling as it provides enhanced visibility and streamlined Command Center operations to reduce the headache of managing security operations for SMBs," Osterman added. "This gives a particularly powerful end-to-end solution for the products when paired."

There's a real need for that kind of comprehensive solution. Just 28 percent of SMBs rate their current ability to mitigate threats, vulnerabilities and attacks as "highly effective," according to the results of a recent Ponemon Institute survey of 1,045 IT and IT security practitioners at SMBs in the U.S. and U.K.

Forty-seven percent of respondents said they have no understanding of how to protect their companies from cyber attacks, the survey found, despite the fact that 67 percent of respondents experienced a cyber attack and 58 percent experienced a data breach within the past year.

Fifty-five percent of respondents said they don't have the budget (and 74 percent said they don't have the in-house expertise) to effectively mitigate cyber risks. One third of respondents said they were unable to determine the root cause of a data breach experienced in the past year.

Forty percent of respondents said their companies experienced an attack involving the compromise of employee passwords in the past year, with the average cost of each attack exceeding $380,000.

"As the threat landscape evolves, cyber criminals are leaving no stone unturned – and companies, no matter how big or small, are only as strong as their weakest link," Ponemon Institute chairman and founder Dr. Larry Ponemon said in a statement.

This article was originally published on December 21, 2018

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